A haunting thriller about a troubled married couple whose vacation to Paris leads them into a nightmare.

Mark and Steph have a relatively happy family with their young daughter in sunny Cape Town until one day when armed men in balaclavas break in to their home. Left traumatized but physically unharmed, Mark and Steph are unable to return to normal and live in constant fear. When a friend suggests a restorative vacation abroad via a popular house swapping website, it sounds like the perfect plan. They find a genial, artistic couple with a charming apartment in Paris who would love to come to Cape Town. Mark and Steph can’t resist the idyllic, light-strewn pictures, and the promise of a romantic getaway. But once they arrive in Paris, they quickly realize that nothing is as advertised. When their perfect holiday takes a violent turn, the cracks in their marriage grow ever wider and dark secrets from Mark's past begin to emerge.

Deftly weaving together two complex and compelling narrators, S. L. Grey builds an intimate and chilling novel of a disintegrating marriage in the wake of a very real trauma. The Apartment is a terrifying and tour-de-force of horror, of psychological thrills, and of haunting suspense.

First sentence(s):
I'm a fangirl.
More often than not, people hit me with that word in a derogatory way. They use it to make me feel devalued, unintelligent, and immature. And you know what? They couldn't be more wrong.

Zombie sighting:
A segment on zombie walks can be found in chapter 1 page 41.

Fanfic, cosplay, cons, books, memes, podcasts, vlogs, OTPs and RPGs and MMOs and more—it’s never been a better time to be a girl geek. The Fangirl’s Guide to the Galaxy is the ultimate handbook for ladies living the nerdy life, a fun and feminist take on the often male-dominated world of geekdom. With delightful illustrations and an unabashed love for all the in(ternet)s and outs of geek culture, this book is packed with tips, playthroughs, and cheat codes for everything from starting an online fan community to planning a convention visit to supporting fellow female geeks in the wild.

My two-bits:

A fun read with a focus on fangirls and their fandoms. Loved how it got into the different aspects of the on-line and real life goings on.

A good way to get in the know of some the hip and happening when it comes to the current pop culture.

First sentence(s):
The babies were born as the clocks struck twelve. As they finally slid from their mothers' bellies, wet and sticky, their tiny faces scrunched up with the effort of being born, their fists clenched and eyes shut tight, a dark cloud crossed the full moon, and out in the forest the sky turned black.

Zombie sighting:Out on the street they stood, all in masks - devils and Frankensteins, warlocks and werewolves, witches and zombies, ghouls and grim reapers.
chapter 23, page 229

Poppy Hooper and Ember Hawkweed couldn’t lead more different lives. Poppy is a troubled teen: moving from school to school, causing chaos wherever she goes, never making friends or lasting connections. Ember is a young witch, struggling to find a place within her coven and prove her worth. Both are outsiders: feeling like they don’t belong and seeking escape.

Poppy and Ember soon become friends, and secretly share knowledge of their two worlds. Little do they know that destiny has brought them together: an ancient prophecy, and a life-changing betrayal. Growing closer, they begin to understand why they’ve never belonged and the reason they are now forever connected to each other.

Switched at birth by the scheming witch Raven Hawkweed, Poppy and Ember must come to terms with their true identities and fight for their own place in the world. Enter Leo, a homeless boy with a painful past who – befriending them both – tests their love and loyalty. Can Poppy and Ember’s friendship survive? And can it withstand the dark forces that are gathering?

My two-bits:

Loved the portrayal of witches and their world in this story. The sisterhood aspect and female strength and bonding was what captured my interest.

Friendship relationships were also touched upon that created cozy and warm feelings throughout the story.

Romance and love had my heart tugging back and forth. I am sooo curious to see how that story settles in the end.

As this is that start of a series, this first book does well in presenting the main characters and their backgrounds.

Eighteen-year-old Bitsy Butler has never quite fit in, not with the dragons who raised her, the druid who took her in, or even with the non-human members of the cirque noir punk band she thinks of as family. Her chance to prove she can make it on her own comes with her band's first big solo tour. It’s all going according to plan when an angel walks into a bar and demands help with his demon problem.

If she doesn't step up, a magical war will break out, threatening Arizona and all those who call it home. With the help of a human, a sexy dragon, and the members of her band, Bitsy must stop an angry mob of chaos demons before the band leaves for their next tour stop.

It’s nice to be needed, but Bitsy has no idea how to defeat the demons and she just might get herself killed trying. But then, at least one problem would be solved...

First sentence(s):
I am dead, but it's not so bad. I've learned to live with it.

R is having a no-life crisis—he is a zombie. He has no memories, no identity, and no pulse, but he is a little different from his fellow Dead. He may occasionally eat people, but he’d rather be riding abandoned airport escalators, listening to Sinatra in the cozy 747 he calls home, or collecting souvenirs from the ruins of civilization.

And then he meets a girl.

First as his captive, then his reluctant guest, Julie is a blast of living color in R’s gray landscape, and something inside him begins to bloom. He doesn't want to eat this girl—although she looks delicious—he wants to protect her. But their unlikely bond will cause ripples they can’t imagine, and their hopeless world won’t change without a fight.

~*~

It is my pleasure to present Sophia Rose of the Delighted Reader today with her mini-review on, Warm Bodies by Isaac Marion.

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by Sophia Rose
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Sophia's two-bits:

I stepped well out of my comfort zone to pick this one up and read it. I know for zombie purists this one is a softball, but for me, it was a test of my fortitude. And gladly, I can report that it was a successful attempt. I loved what the author brought together here with a thought-provoking blend of horror, romance, humor, philosophy and just a poignant story at the end of the world.

About Sophia:

Sophia is a quiet though curious gal who dabbles in cooking, book reviewing, and gardening. Encouraged and supported by an incredible man and loving family.

A Northern Californian transplant to the Great Lakes Region of the US. Lover of Jane Austen, Baseball, Cats, Scooby Doo, and Chocolate.

Wait. What time is it? After midnight. Shit. It wasn't this morning. Better start over.

Braineater Jones wakes up face down in a swimming pool with no memory of his former life, how he died, or why he's now a zombie. With a smart-aleck severed head as a partner, Jones descends into the undead ghetto to solve his own murder.

But Jones's investigation is complicated by his crippling addiction to human flesh. Like all walking corpses, he discovers that only a stiff drink can soothe his cravings. Unfortunately, finding liquor during Prohibition is costly and dangerous. From his Mason jar, the cantankerous Old Man rules the only speakeasy in the city that caters to the postmortem crowd.

As the booze, blood, and clues coagulate, Jones gets closer to discovering the identity of his killer and the secrets behind the city's stranglehold on liquid spirits. Death couldn't stop him, but if the liquor dries up, the entire city will be plunged into an orgy of cannibalism.

Cracking this case is a tall order. Braineater Jones won't get out alive, but if he plays his cards right, he might manage to salvage the last scraps of his humanity.

My two-bits:

Got a kick out of reading this detective zombie story set in the 1930s. The historical elements of slang, characterization and booze creates a classic black and white noir mystery with a zombie twist.

The zombies in this story are of functioning non-gory type that live alongside humans including relations between (ahem).

The mystery solving moves along at a good clip with some funny and snarky moments.

Sefia knows what it means to survive. After her father is brutally murdered, she flees into the wilderness with her aunt Nin, who teaches her to hunt, track, and steal. But when Nin is kidnapped, leaving Sefia completely alone, none of her survival skills can help her discover where Nin’s been taken, or if she’s even alive. The only clue to both her aunt’s disappearance and her father’s murder is the odd rectangular object her father left behind, an object she comes to realize is a book—a marvelous item unheard of in her otherwise illiterate society. With the help of this book, and the aid of a mysterious stranger with dark secrets of his own, Sefia sets out to rescue her aunt and find out what really happened the day her father was killed—and punish the people responsible.

Riley searches for a cure to the virus that took over Samantha before it consumes him and the entire world.

Amusing moment: zombies attempting to remove contact lens

Zombie speed: same as humans

Zombification: like a cold virus, also being bitten

Zombie mode: low-functioning turning evolving into high-functioning

Things to note: Beware of party dip ;-)

=====> After watching the first in this series I was curious enough to give this one a try. The story continues where the first one ends. As with the first, the transformation of human to zombie is the focus. The reason why people are turning starts to be explained. I have a feeling we are in for part 3 at some point.

Saturday, September 17, 2016

Stacking The Shelves is all about sharing the books you are adding to your shelves, may it be physical or virtual. This means you can include books you buy in physical store or online, books you borrow from friends or the library, review books, gifts and of course ebooks!

=====> Booksmith, San Francisco, hosted a visit from author, J.T. LeRoy aka Laura Albert. Two of Laura's book reprints have been released to coincide with a movie that gets into J.T.'s backstory. These stories were a hit when they were originally released and became noticed even more after Laura was revealed as the true author.

Freebie:

The Age of Daredevils
by Michael Clarkson
-History, Non-fiction
courtesy of Amazon First programAmazon | Goodreads

=====> This showing had a special treat of providing coverage of an interview of Oliver Stone, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Shailene Woodley with Ed Snowden (via internet). This was an amazing story that got me thinking of privacy.

First sentence(s):
"You don't have to actually touch the bodies. You just have to check them in." Mr. Lively spread his hands helplessly at the mess of papers on his desk. "It's me who has to deal with the paperwork once you get them in their drawers."

Everyone knows zombies aren’t real, no matter how fun. You don’t have to be a med student to know the dead do not get up and walk around in real life. Anyone who’s buried a pet in the backyard knows the dead don’t walk. They don’t even lurch.

So Giovanni is stunned when his patient sits up in the morgue and starts scolding. The night-shift was supposed be a relief, a chance to study in quiet and off-set ridiculous student loans. Babysitting a huge dog and a dead voodoo mambo were not part of the plan. Now he’s got to convince an unbelieving medical community to take action, so he can get back to learning about the dead – not the undead!

PeekAbook:

My two-bits:

Walking and talking zombies in this one. So, not so gory and rabid for those wanting to know.

This story takes you into a small part the medical world with scenes in the hospital and at the morgue.

Some shady business is introduced to the main character, Giovanni that left me wondering.

The zombie apocalypse has never been more surreal! A mentally unhinged manga artist witnesses the beginning of a zombie outbreak in Tokyo, and he's certain of only two things: he's destined to be the city's hero, and he possesses something very rare in Japan--an actual firearm!

Kengo Hanazawa's award-winning series comes to Dark Horse, and this realistically-drawn international bestseller takes us from initial small battles for survival to a huge, body-horror epidemic that threatens all of humanity! These special omnibus volumes will collect two of the original Japanese books into each Dark Horse edition and include all of the color pages.

My two-bits:

This book was mostly filled with the life and details of a manga artist trying to make it big in Japan.

Gradual zombie action moves through this book until the last quarter of the book. It took awhile for the hero to realize what the heck was going on.

Wednesday, September 14, 2016

You don’t have to be a medical student to know the dead do not get up and walk around. Anyone who’s buried a pet in the backyard knows the dead don’t walk. They don’t even lurch.

The night-shift in the morgue was supposed to be a chance to study in quiet and off-set ridiculous student loans. Giovanni is stunned when his patient sits up and starts scolding. Now he’s got to convince an unbelieving medical community to take action, so he can get back to learning about the dead – not the undead!

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by Kathy Bryson
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I’m thrilled to be part of the September Zombie Event. Thanks for having me Velvet!

Most people think back-to-school in September, but for me, back-to-school and zombies go hand-in-hand. That’s because my zombie series is based on true events that occurred at my school. It’s true, you can ask Giovanni himself.

Hi all! I’m Giovanni, the hero of Giovanni Goes to Med School and yes, I am a real person. I’m also a medical student.

So the zombie is based on a true story?

Yes, an elderly lady came into my ER to get her arm reset and stopped breathing on the table. We were able to resuscitate her however.

That’s good, but she wasn’t actually a zombie right?

Well, a couple of the other tutors (that’s my other job) got to debating about where zombies come from. The original idea was not shuffling dead bodies, but something much more sinister from voodoo and slavery in Haiti.

So the book’s about voodoo?

The whole series of novellas explores where the supernatural and medical science collide. The modern world doesn’t have all the answers to some classic questions yet!

So, you think a real zombie outbreak is possible?

What actually happens to the human body as it decomposes makes for some of the funniest moments of the book – in a really gagging sort of way!

What inspired you to go to medical school?

I’ve always been intrigued by how the human body works and I wanted to help out my community. My family isn’t the wealthiest and I’ve seen a lot of people who’ve put off medical care because of finances.

Your original degree was in Italian though?

Right, hence the name Giovanni – not my real name!

Do you think it was necessary to change your name for protection?

Oh no, I’m just waiting until the book becomes famous or the zombie outbreak occurs before I go public.

There’s more?

Oh, yeah! The writing tutor recording my adventures has only just started on what really goes on at college!

Excerpt:

“New, huh?” Fred scrawled something across the bottom of the page and handed it back to Giovanni. “Don’t worry about it. Everybody freaks out at first, but you get used to it.”

He waved vaguely at the back wall with its row after row of file drawers that didn’t hold paper. “C’mon, I’ll help you put her away this time.”

More grateful than he could ever express, Giovanni helped Fred maneuver the recalcitrant gurney over to the back wall and nervously unlocked and opened a square metal door. What looked like a file drawer was actually one part of a self-contained refrigeration unit. This was a small morgue according to the manual. Everyone got his or her own drawer, but shared a central cooling and back up system unlike the county facility where everyone shared shelf space in a refrigerated room.

Fred had no nervous qualms and instead had the white cloth whipped off the gurney and the drawer’s metal tray pulled out in one smooth move. “Okay, you lift the feet and I’ll get the head.”

Giovanni looked down and was surprised. The white swathed figure on the gurney looked like a load of laundry more than anything. “It’s so small.”

“Yeah.” Fred carefully angled himself in between the wall and the head of the gurney. He gently slid both hands under the figure’s shoulders so its head rested on his forearms. “Most of the elderly are by the time they pass. Just wasted away. It’s the fat bastards who die of heart attacks that are a pain. On the count of three, lift.”

Giovanni hurried to slide his hands under the figure’s legs and lifted. The body shifted easily to the sliding tray.

Fred stepped back and reaching for the white cloth, began folding it. “Shame really,” he said, regarding the body solemnly and shaking his head. “Mrs. Harris was a real nice lady.”

“Wait? Mrs. Harris?” Giovanni’s glance darted between the still figure and the clipboard of papers he held in one hand. “I know her. She was in the ER this morning.”

Fred nodded. “Regular customer. Guess this was her last trip.” He squinted at Giovanni as he put the folded cloth down. “You okay, son?”

“Yeah, yeah, of course,’ Giovanni pulled himself together. “I just thought she’d made it. She had a dislocated elbow.” His mind skittered away from the memory of Mrs. Harris not breathing as she lay in the ER exam room.

“Well, it happens.” Fred eyed him from underneath lowered brows, and then shrugged. Apparently he wasn’t going to concern himself any further as he proceeded to wrestle and curse his gurney back into the freight elevator. He didn’t even look back or wave as he pressed the button for an upper floor.

Giovanni did wave, but absently, and hurried back to the morgue as soon as the freight elevator doors closed. He flipped urgently through the paperwork on his clipboard, but there were no patient records included, just blank forms waiting for the morgue manager’s signature to ensure the right body was handed off to the right funeral home. At her age and in her physical condition, Mrs. Harris wouldn’t merit any attention from the medical examiner. She was simply an old lady who had passed as everyone did eventually.

Giovanni sighed and put down the paperwork. He didn’t see where he could do anything more for Mrs. Harris and the hope that maybe he’d done enough started to creep up on him. After all, the other, fully qualified doctors had administered the actual anesthetic. He was probably just feeling indoctrinated guilt from being raised in a large Catholic, Italian family.

Dimly in the background, he heard a mournful howl. Rufus, he thought with an inward eye roll and it didn’t even occur to him how eerily appropriate it was for the dog to howl just then. Instead, he reached for a pen and the toe tag on the bundle in front of him, determined to ensure that Mrs. Harris reached her final rest without mistake.

The toe tag pulled away. Frowning, Giovanni reached again. The toe tag slid away from him and he watched horrified as the swathed figure writhed, then sat up. From somewhere behind him, he could hear frantic barking and a high-pitched wail. When he gasped for breath, he realized the wail came from him even as the cocooned corpse bent forward and mumbled, “Sonny, you scream like a girl.”

Kathy Bryson knew she wanted to be a writer when she finished reading through her school and local children's libraries. She honed her writing skills on marketing brochures, websites, and several unfinished manuscripts before going into teaching and finishing award-winning books with all the stuff she enjoys most - from coffee to love to Shakespeare!

Kathy lives in Florida where she caters to the whims of spoiled cats and wonders what possessed her to put in 75 feet of flower beds.

A mysterious incident in Russia, a blip buried in the news—it’s the only warning humanity receives that civilization will soon be destroyed by a single, voracious virus that creates monsters of men.

Humanity falls…

A lawyer, still grieving over the death of his young wife, begins to write as a form of therapy. Bur he never expected that his anonymous blog would ultimately record humanity’s last days.

The end of the world has begun…

Governments scramble to stop the zombie virus, people panic, so-called “Safe Havens” are established, the world erupts into chaos; soon it’s every man, woman, and child for themselves. Armed only with makeshift weapons and the will to live, a lone survivor will give mankind one last chance against…

The electrifying sequel to international best seller Apocalypse Z
The Russian-spawned virus that kills swiftly then ghoulishly resurrects its victims as ravenous cannibals has breached international borders.

The infernal progression…

From outbreak to epidemic and pandemic to sheer panic, the virus has shredded global civilization. Promised safe havens become deathtraps, lawlessness crumbles any remaining symbol of authority, and political violence in Spain threatens to erupt in civil war.

Trapped…

In the thick of the deadly madness, the young lawyer finds himself escaping to the Canary Islands in a stolen chopper with a motley crew made up of his Persian cat Lucullus, Ukrainian pilot Viktor “Prit” Pritchenko, 17-year-old beautiful distraction Lucia, and Sister Cecilia, who was trained as a nurse. The distant isle of Lanzarote is rumored to be the only refuge out of the virus’s reach. But with relentlessly multiplying hordes of the living dead—and equally fatal human treachery—blocking their every move, their quest for survival is quickly becoming a suicide mission.

An act of terrorism unleashed an unspeakable biological weapon...and hell on earth. But as the masses felled by a hideous virus rose from the dead to prey on the living, a small band of survivors defied death and its ghastly spawn—determined to outrun the world’s end and somehow begin again.

To Armageddon...

But beyond the undead-besieged shores of Europe lies something closer to damnation than salvation. Rescued from certain death at sea, a young Spanish lawyer, the beautiful woman he loves, and his brash, battle-hardened best friend—who have weathered the worst of the unnatural disaster—think they’re escaping to freedom but are delivered into a stronghold of hate. In a United States ravaged by a zombie plague and overrun by the undead, only Gulfport, Mississippi, offers sanctuary...for a price: subservience to a fascist dictator and his brutal enforcers. But their reign of terror will soon be challenged—by rebels hungry for vengeance and invaders bent on conquest.

=====> While speaking with a bookseller at the local bookstore about current zombie books available, a fellow customer chimed in and recommended this series set in Spain. I just ordered it and look forward to adding it to my zombie book shelf.

Several of the characters from BRAINEATER JONES have secret origins which are so nutty I suspect most people would never be able to guess if I didn’t tell them. One of the most interesting is Alcibé’s two-and-a-half-millennia journey from ancient Athenian warlord to severed head on Braineater’s desk. But I’ve already told that story elsewhere, so you’ll just have to suffer the never knowing. Or I guess you could look up that other guest post. Either way.

Almost as circuitous is the story of Ivan Skaron, one of Braineater’s early clients. Some of you may know that I recently published my fifth novel, HUNTER OF THE DEAD, about a showdown between vampires and vampire hunters in modern day Las Vegas. What you probably don’t know is that HUNTER OF THE DEAD began (un)life as a screenplay in 2003.

The movie version of “Queen of the Damned” had recently come out and while I enjoyed it for what it was, it made me realize that something that had been bothering me for a long time. Vampires on the silver screen bore almost zero resemblance to the folkloric monsters I had eagerly studied as a child. “Buffy” and “Angel” were also in full tilt at the time, and while they were compelling stories, the vampires just kind of hung out indoors during the daytime and they could even eat chicken wings if they felt like it for some reason.

Where were the coffins? The aspen stakes? The insatiable desire to count dropped objects? What about the soil of the homeland? The need to bury a vampire’s head at a crossroads? All those weird, wacky Old World myths and minutia?

Sure, even then I understood a vampire in almost any work of fiction is a metaphor. But didn’t that mean that writers were essentially leaving the folkloric vampyr on the table, unused? My answer was the “Hunter of the Dead” screenplay, which was chock full of obscure vampirana. And as a beer-swilling, college-aged American boy, basically every character in my screenplay was some kind of badass kill-happy Rambo-type dude.

And none were more badass or murder-happy than the Emperor of the Vampires himself…who I didn’t have a name for. But also at that time, being a huge fan of SyFy (then SciFi) Channel’s “Farscape” I decided to name him after the biggest, baddest-ass villains in the galaxy: the Scarrans. The vampire emperor was Russian, and being not very far removed from having read THE BROTHERS KARAMAZOV, I decided to name him after the eldest Karamazov brother as well. And thus was born Ivan Skaron. The little spelling change was so that nobody would ever notice I had cribbed from SciFi. Well, unless I happened to write about it in a blogpost someday. But I digress.

This may surprise you to learn (though probably not if you know anything about Hollywood) but studios are not exactly clamoring to accept a spec script from an unknown, unconnected college student. And so “Hunter of the Dead” was shelved for almost thirteen years, before finally finding new life as a novel in 2016.

And wouldn’t you know it, but the novel HUNTER OF THE DEAD does not feature an Ivan Skaron character. It does feature a similar character – now an empress – called Lily Luchesi, who fulfilled all of Ivan Skaron’s functions from the screenplay. So why the change? Well, two reasons.

First of all, I’m thirteen years older now, and I like to think my writing has evolved somewhat, and not every character needs to go “boom boom, pow, I beat you up!” Some can even have depth now. Some can even be (gasp!) women!

Second of all, Ivan Skaron had been repurposed and found new life in 2013 as a character in BRAINEATER JONES. The character was similar in personality and behavior, but instead of being a vampiric overlord he had become an academic with a dark secret life. But to find out any more than that, I’m afraid you’ll have to read the book. :)